


I'm Not Ready (For the Weight of Us)

by Sproid



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, fighting is foreplay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-28
Updated: 2012-08-28
Packaged: 2017-11-13 02:25:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/498420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sproid/pseuds/Sproid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha and Clint through their first months together; the evolution of a person and a relationship.</p><p>
  <i>Sometimes she thought he was a figment of her imagination, like so many other things she couldn't forget. The reason he hadn't come to see her was because he didn't exist; he was a hallucination, a remnant, the product of a brain stretched too far by experimentation and exhaustion.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm Not Ready (For the Weight of Us)

Clint isn't worried. 

Really, he's not. He knows damn well that Natasha's capable of handling whatever Fury throws at her and then going back for more. Just because she's been in his office for three hours now doesn't mean that things are going badly. Fury probably approved Natasha's enrollment with SHIELD within two minutes, and they've spent the rest of the time exchanging frightening stories from their even more frightening pasts.

No, Clint isn't worried. He might be a little anxious though, which is why he's currently sat in his room cleaning his bows while listening to radio chatter. Just in case. If Natasha and Fury had a throwdown he'd probably hear the commotion even from here, but it pays to have an ear to every available source of information.

At the knock on his door, Clint scrambles off the bed so quickly that he almost gets tangled up in the sheets and just barely stops himself going head first into the wall. Gives his elbow a good whack in the process though, which hurts like hell. When he opens the door to Natasha, who definitely heard the thump, she looks amused but doesn't say anything. Clint's pride is grateful for that.

“So,” Clint says casually, ignoring the fact that his elbow is sending all sorts of nasty tingles up his arm. “No escort, no blood, and I see you have a shiny new security card. I assume things went well?”

Natasha gets that look that she always does when he asks something like that, the one that says that even after three months she still doesn't quite understand why he cares enough to enquire. That's OK. At least she answers him now rather than ignoring the question.

“I don't think Fury likes me,” she says with a shrug. “But he's put me on a sixth month probationary period with Coulson as my handler.” She says it carefully, without inflection, as if it means nothing to her one way or the other. Clint knows differently but he also understands why she doesn't want to reveal how much it means to her. He won't call her on it, and she won't thank him for doing so, but the acknowledgement of both is there in a brief moment of eye contact.

“We need to celebrate,” Clint decides. “Both your promotion, and the fact that you can now go off base without an escort.”

“You have something in mind?” Natasha asks, somewhat warily.

That one, Clint will give her. Even he has to admit that not all of his ideas regarding celebrations are entirely sensible.

“Pancakes,” he decides. “And not the crappy ones from the cafeteria either. There's this little place two blocks away that does the best pancakes, and their syrup is _amazing_.”

She considers it for a moment, and then nods. “Alright. Give me ten minutes to change and I'll meet you outside.”

“Bring an appetite!” Clint calls as she walks away. For some reason that appears to amuse her, because she turns and half-smiles at him, which happens so rarely that Clint grins back until she rounds the corner. Then he ducks back into his room before anyone else sees his goofy smile; he doesn't need everyone knowing that Natasha is his new favourite person on base. If the news got back to Coulson, the guy would be devastated.

\-- -- -- -- --

They didn't let Clint see Natasha for three weeks after he brought her in.

He stayed with her for as long as possible. Sat beside her on the plane, walked at her side as they were escorted onto the base, pushed his way into the interrogation room after her before anyone could stop him. The agents outside looked pissed at that but Coulson informed them that Clint was acting under his orders – he _really_ wasn't; Clint was going to owe him big time after this – and they backed off. 

Natasha – Natalia, then – didn't say a word the entire time, didn't move, didn't do anything except sit in the chair and stare blankly at a point two inches to the left of Clint's head. There was dried blood beneath her fingernails, dull red streaks across her cheek, dark patches staining her clothes. Clint had no fucking clue what she was thinking, if she was even thinking anything right now. For all he knew she could be plotting to kill him and he wouldn't have any idea until the point she had her hands around his neck.

There was no way he was leaving her until he absolutely had to though. She'd turned herself in to him, he was damn well going to make sure nothing happened to her on his watch.

When Coulson opened the door with six guys behind him, all armed, Clint knew this was as far as he was going to be allowed to go. At least it was Coulson come to drag his ass out of here. Another thing he was going to owe the guy for after this.

The chair legs scraped against the floor as Clint pushed it away to stand up, the harsh sound unnaturally loud in the silent room. For the first time since she'd placed her guns on the ground in Russia, Natasha looked at him.

“Hey,” Clint said quietly. “These guys are gonna forcibly remove me from here if I don't leave, so I figure it'd be better if I save them the trouble and me the pain. I'll be back though, as soon as they let me. That's a promise.” 

Natasha turned back to look at the wall. Clint hoped she believed him, and knew that she didn't.

\-- -- -- -- --

Food as a celebration isn't something Natasha's familiar with but she's definitely not averse to it. Clint certainly seems to be enjoying his pancakes, shovelling them down in between chattering endlessly about whatever is on his mind when he opens his mouth, which is a baffling variety of topics. Amazingly, he manages to be both coherent and mostly witty (although often his puns are awful, and he knows it). It's still a lot to keep up with.

What's even more baffling to Natasha though is how unaware he is of his surroundings. He's got no armour, no weapon, no backup, and yet apart from a quick scan of the room when they walked in, he seems utterly unconcerned about what's going on around him. As far as she can tell, it's not an act either. He's genuinely not paying attention. It doesn't make sense. They're off-base, unprotected, without back-up; he should be _more_ on-guard, not less.

“I don't understand you,” she says when he pauses to take another bite of pancake.

“Huh? Oh, sorry, was I talking too fast?”

“No no, not that,” she says impatiently. “You're here, in this tiny cafe where anyone could be watching, or attack at any moment, and you've barely looked up from your plate since we got here. Why aren't you watching the cafe, or the waitress, or the people coming in?”

Leaning back in his chair, Clint shrugs and glances around as if he's just remembered where they are. “It pays to be careful, you're right,” he agrees, “but get too careful and you run the risk of being paranoid, of never being able to go anywhere without watching your back and wondering who might be around the corner. I don't wanna be like that.”

Natasha can't imagine not being like that. She thinks he knows that. Maybe that's his secondary objective in bringing her here, to try and make her adjust.

“Besides,” Clint adds. “You're here, and I know damn well you've been keeping an eye on things since we walked in. I figure you'd let me know if we were about to be attacked.”

“That makes even less sense,” she tells him bluntly. “How do you know you can trust me?”

Clint smiles. “I've watched you put yourself back together for three months. I think I can trust you.”

There's so much she wants to say to that. That she'd been doing that for sixth months before he'd found her, and he has no idea what she fashioned herself into then. That even now, sometimes she still feels like she's falling apart, and it'd be so easy to let it happen. That some nights she doesn't think she can face the next day and wishes she could go back two years to when everything was simple and she didn't care about any of it. That she's a different person now than before but not a new one, and she could kill him with ease before he even had a chance to register where the attack was coming from.

None of it would make any difference to him though, so all she says is, “You're an idiot, Barton,” and goes back to eating her pancakes.

\-- -- -- -- --

The first three weeks at SHIELD were not the worst time Natasha could remember. That honour went to the day she'd found her file and confirmed that she wasn't going mad, that in fact half of her memories were lies expertly (but not perfectly) intermingled with the real ones.

Neither were they the second worst. That moment of her life had occurred very recently, after she'd killed the last of the people who had stripped her of everything that should have been hers and pushed their own creations in to replace them. Not because she realised what she'd done – of that she was well aware and regretted precisely none of it – but because she'd looked down at their bodies with the terrifying realisation that now she had nothing to work towards.

Then Barton had shown up with an intention to kill her that had changed into an offer of somewhere to go and someone to work for. For lack of energy and options, she'd accepted.

After the first 24 hours – most of which she was asleep for, beyond caring that she was in a strange facility in which she had no control – she spent her time keeping track of the days, measuring them by the meals that got delivered to her door, the trips to the interrogation room, the medical bay, the psychiatrist's office, the endless meetings with endless people until they finally believed that she wasn't going to try and kill them all.

Not once did she ask after Barton. 

He'd promised to come back but she didn't believe him, apart from the fact that she couldn't forget the fierce determination on his face as he'd said it.

And yet.

Sometimes she thought he was a figment of her imagination, like so many other things she couldn't forget. The reason he hadn't come to see her was because he didn't exist; he was a hallucination, a remnant, the product of a brain stretched too far by experimentation and exhaustion. Maybe she'd made him up, maybe someone had put him there so that she'd let herself be taken in without a struggle, calmed by the man with sharp eyes and steady hands. Either way, if she didn't mention him, they couldn't use him against her.

And then, three weeks after she'd held out her hands to him and hadn't killed him while he cuffed her, Barton showed up at her door with a careful smile and a plate of cold pizza.

\-- -- -- -- -- --

It was Coulson who told Clint - after far too many days spent convincing people that he hadn't a) defected to the Russians; b) defected to an evil government agency; c) made a deal with Natasha to take down SHIELD from the inside for their own purposes; d) entirely lost his ability to make rational decisions – that Natasha had been provisionally cleared and could have visitors. 

It was also Coulson who put a hand on his arm before he could leave the room and said, “Be very careful, Barton. It looks like she's on our side but we only have the barest clue of who and what she is, much less who and what she used to be. She could very well be playing us, and you.”

“I know. I'll keep my wits about me.”

“For what it's worth,” Coulson added. “I don't think she is. And I think you made the right call bringing her in. But be careful.”

For the first time in days, Clint smiled. “Thanks, boss.”

Cold pizza in hand – courtesy of the cafeteria, who always made too much for Friday film nights – Clint drew a breath and knocked on Natasha's door. A few seconds later it opened slowly to reveal Natasha, clad in SHIELD-issue clothes, looking at him with something that was surprise and relief and disbelief all at once before she wiped it blank. They looked at each other silently for a few moments, Clint absurdly glad that she was alright even though Coulson had told him that she was, Natasha scanning him up and down as if to check he was all there which didn't make any sense, but hey.

“Uh... hi,” Clint said after a few moments, carefully schooling his expression into something he hoped was a friendly smile rather than a ridiculous grin. “Pizza?”

\-- -- -- -- --

A week after her official enrollment, Natasha and Coulson get sent to Drammen, Norway, for something subtle and diplomatic with a high potential for violence if things go wrong, which Clint thinks probably couldn't be more perfect for her. Clint walks with her to the jet and waves her off with a handkerchief, calling “I'll write you every day, darling, I promise,” while pretending to wipe away tears. Natasha looks bemused and ignores him.

They get back four days later, right on schedule. The woman who walks off the jet is not the same one who went in. Or rather, she is, but she's something else, too. She looks more like the person Clint tracked through Russia for days; more confident, less haunted, as if she's remembered that not everything she is and can do are bad things.

Clint clutches the same handkerchief to his chest and walks toward them gushing, “Natasha, my love, I was so worried about you. You've been gone for so long, I thought you'd died or forgotten about me. I've missed you so much, oh, let me hold you!”

Threading her arm through Coulson's, Natasha pushes Clint away with a hand on his chest. “I'm having an affair with Phil,” she responds cooly. “We've been through so much together now, and he's far better in bed than you.”

Coulson rolls his eyes and extricates himself from Natasha's grip. “I knew this would happen,” he sighs. “Behave yourselves, you two. Natasha, debrief with Sitwell in his office in half an hour.”

Clint grins at Natasha as Coulson walks away. “Mission went well?” he asks, falling into step with her as she heads for the elevator.

With a decisive nod, she replies, “Very well.”

\-- -- -- -- --

After Fury's "I don't trust you but you might be useful so welcome aboard" meeting with Natasha, Coulson stayed in the office, well aware that his boss had something on his mind. 

“Looks as if we've got a new member of the team,” he said conversationally, crossing one leg over the other. Deliberately, he added, “Barton will be happy.”

“I'm not entirely sure that's a good thing,” Fury replied, flipping Natasha's file shut. “That boy has a damn big heart for someone who regularly kills people as part of his job. He'll trust Romanoff because his gut tells him to, regardless of what she's capable of doing.”

“True,” Coulson allowed. “Perhaps she needs that.”

“And if she turns out to be a double agent, and uses Barton to get to the rest of us?”

“You'll stop Romanoff; Barton will get some sense knocked into him and learn for next time.”

Fury snorted. “Sometimes you're as much of a smartass as Barton is, Coulson.”

“Thank you, sir.”

\-- -- -- -- --

See, here's the thing. 

Clint keeps finding Natasha looking at him like even now, she can't figure out why he's hanging around with her. It happens less often than it used to and she doesn't look suspicious any more, just confused, but sometimes he'll offer to do something for her or ask how she is and it's obvious that she doesn't have any idea why he cares one way or the other.

What she doesn't know, and what Clint doesn't know how to tell her, is a) that he actually likes her and b) that he needs a friend as much as Natasha does. Or as much as he thinks she does. He still doesn't know what she's thinking most of the time. Maybe it's idiotic to cast the Black Widow in the role of his friend, but he's done it anyway, and he'll carry on doing so until she gives him a damn good reason not to.

Hopefully she won't get fed up with him before he figures out a way to tell her some of that.

\-- -- -- -- --

There are more missions and debriefs, and slowly Natasha starts to get a feel for where she might belong. SHIELD might not be the good guys – she's sure they've got their dubious background just like all these organisations do – but that's never been an issue for her before and it isn't now either. They're not overly fond of the people who she used to work for, which is a point in their favour, and she has no problems carrying out the missions they give her.

Coulson is a good handler. Calm, concise, collected. She thinks he might genuinely believe in heroes and the triumph of good over evil, but he's not naïve about it and he'll get his hands dirty if he has to. Fury still watches her, but with slightly less suspicion every time she comes back with the objective completed and without having escaped to sell their secrets. He still doesn't trust her, but she doesn't trust him either so that's fair. In contrast, Fury's second in command Maria Hill seems to genuinely like Natasha. That throws her a little, but she chooses to ignore it and pursue the acquaintance, albeit cautiously.

Throughout it all, contrary to her expectations, Clint is there. They go for pancakes and coffee, get lunch together when they're both on-base, wind Coulson up with their mix of blunt humour and subtle wit. Around the base they become known for being inseparable, which Natasha's not sure she likes because she's not used to being that predictable. The unease is not enough to make her stop doing it.

Most of the time she doesn't know why Clint continues to associate with her. From their conversations – which rarely stray into the past, but sometimes brush there despite their best efforts – she's gleaned enough to know that he's seen a lot of the awful things this world has to offer and hates every single one of them. By rights he shouldn't want anything to do with her, but the fact remains that he does. She's stopped trying to work out what his agenda is; it's an odd concept but she thinks maybe he doesn't have one. Perhaps that's an overly optimistic outlook, but there's something about the analysis that feels right. For the first time in her life, she makes the decision not to worry about it, and just accepts that Clint is going to stay with her.

\-- -- -- -- --

It's the end of a week that's been too long for no reason that Natasha can pinpoint, apart from that she's felt more on-edge and out of place than since she first arrived here. Usually she and Clint go out for food on a Friday but she's really not up for that tonight. On the other hand, staying on base surrounded by people who for the most part neither like nor trust her is not a more appealing prospect.

She hasn't felt aimless since Russia. It makes her feel unsettled and unsure, and she hates it.

Clint takes one look at her when he opens his door and says, “Let's not go out tonight. Wanna watch a film at my apartment and order in pizza?”

Natasha blinks in surprise at that. Firstly, because she didn't know he had an apartment; secondly because he has no reason whatsoever to invite her into his space so easily, even if it's a space he obviously rarely uses. 

“I'm bored, I don't want to stay here tonight, and you look like you could do with being elsewhere too,” Clint adds when Natasha doesn't answer him.

“What kind of film?” Natasha asks cautiously.

Clint laughs. “You've been talking to Coulson,” he accuses. “I promise you my taste in films is not that bad. But you can choose anyway.”

“Alright,” Natasha agrees, and savours the warmth she feels at being invited to share his home with him.

They sit on the one sofa that Clint has, pizza on the table in front of them, television screen illuminating the room gently with flickering light. Clint is warm against Natasha's side – it's not a big sofa and he sprawls out over it like he's forgotten she's there – silent for once as he watches the action. She should find his lack of chatter disconcerting. Instead it's soothing, being able to sit with someone without having to talk, to explain herself, to listen, to be constantly on guard. By the time the credits roll, she feels more settled than she has done all day. Not perfect but she didn't expect that. Better is enough.

“Any time,” Clint says when she thanks him. “I mean that,” he adds, reaching over to touch his fingers to hers for a moment. His gaze is open and honest and he's smiling, and the coldness she's been feeling all week from everyone else recedes just a little.

 _I know_ she thinks, and places her hand over his to squeeze briefly before she leaves. 

\-- -- -- -- --

Two pm on a Wednesday afternoon is the most boring time of the week, in Clint's opinion. No-one ever needs anyone taking out on a Wednesday. He's fairly sure that governments the world over have Wednesdays off, the bastards. He doesn't get the day off, which is totally unfair. Instead he's sat in the cafeteria with a mug of coffee, listening in to other people's conversations so he's got all the gossip to share with Coulson later.

“You looked bored,” Natasha says, sliding into the seat opposite him.

“Ugh,” Clint replies intelligently. She levels a considering gaze at him. “What?” he says suspiciously. “I don't like that look. It means you're about to suggest something that sounds like a good idea but really isn't.”

“As opposed to yours, which both sound like and actually are a bad idea?”

“I'm honest, sue me,” he says, giving in to the urge to smile, because Natasha mocking him will never not cheer him up. “Go on then, what've you got?”

“Maria's out of the office until the weekend; I need a sparring partner,” Natasha says.

“Now that sounds like a _really_ bad idea. I've heard stories about how you beat the crap out of Hill on a regular basis.” He puts his cup down. “I'm in.”

Clint knows how this is going to turn out before they even get to the gym. He's good at hand-to-hand and he's got weight on his side along with a good few years of experience, but she's at least as strong as him, a lot faster, better trained, and all in all vastly outmatches him by way of being _Natasha_.

They start off slow, sizing each other up, circling as they test each other. She's light on her feet, firm with her strikes, quick to defend and sneaky to attack. He's not doing too badly himself, he thinks; she doesn't look bored, at least. They're both holding back though, not approaching the other's limits, and by the end of the first few rounds have both taken the other down pretty much an equal number of times.

“Shall we do this properly?” Clint asks as Natasha pulls him up from the mat. He bounces on his feet, rolls his shoulders, holds her eyes as he challenges her.

“Think you can handle it?” she shoots back, meeting his gaze with no hesitation.

“Not a chance,” he grins.

This time they really go for it, and within the first thirty seconds Clint realises just how much she held back before. She makes first contact, sends him reeling back and doesn't give him time to recover before she's launching more blows at him. He's taken off-guard but somehow manages to block most of them and gets in a lucky hit of his own that gives him chance to escape to the other side of the mat.

“I'm so screwed,” he says, breathing heavily before dodging the kick she aims at his midriff. He catches her leg and pulls to unbalance her; she hits the ground, rolls and is back up again before he can take advantage of it.

“Yes,” she agrees, smirking. “Want to give up?”

His answer is the same as before. “Not a chance.”

He uses everything he knows, every bit of strength he has, every dirty trick he's picked up over the years until his breath is panting in his ears and sweat is stinging his eyes, and still Natasha keeps coming. She's breathing as hard as he is, strands of wet hair plastered to her face, but her gaze is just as determined as when they started. She's knocked him to the ground more times than he can count and at this point it's only his stubbornness that makes him keep getting back up; he's beaten and he knows it, but there's no way he's going to make this easy for her.

“Give it up, Barton,” she growls.

“Make me.”

Her eyes narrow. 

Clint has time to think “Oh, shit,” before she attacks.

It's a short, furious round which he never has any chance of winning. This time when she knocks him down she follows him, holding his arms behind his back so they're trapped when he hits the floor, the other hand on his chest with her weight behind it, one knee on his groin just in case and her free leg braced on the ground. Trying to twist free proves futile; attempting to buck her off results in him whimpering as her knee presses painfully into his groin. With a groan, he lets his head thump against the mat in defeat.

“Yield?” she asks, leaning over him so she can see his face. She looks dangerous as hell and extremely satisfied.

“Yeah,” he rasps out, letting himself relax into her grip. “To the victor, the spoils.”

Suddenly Natasha looks a whole lot less satisfied.

Neither of them make any attempt to get up. Clint can feel her hand press hard against his sternum as he drags breath into his lungs; his shoulders ache from the position his arms are in; he's bruised and battered and he can feel the heat from her body making him flush with more than exertion. Every time he moves she tightens her hold on him, eyes holding his, daring him to try and break free. He doesn't. He pretty much loves being here. From the predatory look on her face, she's got no objections to it either.

Finally Clint's breathing slows to a rate where he can consider speaking in consecutive sentences. “So,” he says. “You wanna get coffee sometime?”

\-- -- -- -- --

Natasha leaves Clint looking very confused on the mat – a result of her saying 'no' to the coffee and then pressing a kiss to the side of his mouth before she gets up – and takes some time to consider things.

She thinks about the way Clint felt beneath her, the look of arousal and affection on his face as she'd held him down. She thinks about his smile when he makes her laugh, the way he's been a solid presence while everything else has been shifting and swaying, how he's not afraid to stand up to her and equally not afraid to concede. She thinks about going for coffee with him, flirting over the table, going to bed with him afterwards. She thinks about taking what they've got and going deeper.

It's a scary concept.

It's a good thought.

\-- -- -- -- --

Maria comes back on Saturday, for which Natasha is grateful. Her presence is soothing in a way that Clint's isn't just at the moment, and she appreciates the opportunity to talk to someone whose advice she has come to value.

“So,” Maria says, collapsing onto the mat after they've gone a few rounds in the gym. “D'you want to go shopping this afternoon?”

Pausing in her stretches, Natasha wonders if all SHIELD respond so favourably to being beaten up or if it's just Maria and Clint. “Why?”

“Because I've got the afternoon off, and I don't think Fury will come with me.”

A snort escapes Natasha at that, and Maria looks amused.

“And I thought if you're going for coffee with Barton, you might want to do it in some clothes that SHIELD didn't buy for you.”

Actually, Natasha hadn't considered that, but it's a good point. It'd also be good to get off-base for a while and clear her head.

“Yes,” she says decisively. “Let's go shopping.”

\-- -- -- -- --

It's Monday the next time she and Clint spar. Clint ends up on the floor beneath her again, looking just as happy to be there this time as he did last time.

“Let's get coffee,” she murmurs, leaning over him again.

“Sure,” he says dazedly, watching her mouth as it approaches his.

“Does Coulson know you're this easy to manipulate when you're on your back?” she asks, nipping at his lip before she pulls back.

He laughs, shaking his head. “Coulson's never had me on my back, so, no.”

“His loss,” Natasha says. Clint gets a soft look on his face that he quickly hides with a cocky smirk, and Natasha lets it slide as she hauls him to his feet.

\-- -- -- -- --

They go for coffee. Natasha is relieved when it isn't awkward, which it so easily could have been. Clint is Clint, only a little more flirty, slightly more shy. He flushes when she brushes her leg against his underneath the table, but gets a grin on his face and gives as good as he gets.

Then they go for coffee again, because according to Clint, “I'm old-fashioned. I don't put out until at least the fourth date.”

Part of Natasha wants to get the dates over and done with as quickly as possible and move onto the main event, so she can stop feeling so edgy around him and they can regain their previous stability. Another part of her enjoys it though, likes seeing Clint when he's slightly flustered, revels in the anticipation before a date that she hasn't experienced before. It's fun and it's frustrating and it's new, and she supposes it's just another thing she has to learn how to now.

\-- -- -- -- --

It's a Saturday evening, three weeks after their first coffee date. They're in Clint's apartment again, empty Chinese cartons and an empty bottle of wine on the table in front of them while they watch the film they'd rented earlier. Clint is watching it, anyway. Natasha is watching Clint. He's had a few couple of glasses of wine and has slipped lower in the sofa as the evening has gone on. Now he's hot and solid against her side, one jean-clad thigh pressed against her own, t-shirt sleeve rubbing gently against her arm as he breathes deep and easy with his arms crossed loosely over his chest. He must be aware that she's watching him – she could be subtle about it but she's not today – but he keeps his gaze on the screen and seems not to notice, seemingly utterly relaxed as he watches the action with eyes half-lidded and just barely focussed.

Natasha wants to lean over and kiss him until he's breathing fast and needy, until the wine-induced flush on his cheeks deepens with arousal, until he's in no position to resist when she pushes him down to lie on the sofa where she can spread herself over him while she slides her hands over his body to touch and tease and explore. 

So she does, turns to face him on the sofa, places one hand on the side of his face and presses her lips to his in a kiss that turns hot and messy as soon as he realises what she's doing. 

“Nat,” he groans as her mouth pulls away from his, hands coming up to rest on her waist before she can move away too far, instinctive rather then conscious because it's obvious she's not going anywhere. His eyes are wide, cheeks streaked red, breath rasping in his throat as he stares up at her. So beautiful, so strong, so eager. There is no way in which she does not want to have him tonight.

“Shhh,” she murmurs, pushing on the shoulder that's closest to her and pulling the one that's furthest away, pulling him around. He gets the idea, braces himself with one foot on the ground as he lifts the other onto the sofa, knee bent so that his leg actually fits on there. His neck rests against the arm of the sofa so he's half-upright, and he watches her with almost disbelieving eyes as she lifts herself over him.

“This is pretty much everything I've wanted for weeks,” he breathes, voice stuttering as she settles herself just above his hips. He's hard beneath her, bucks up slightly and groans low in his throat when she tightens her legs around him and presses him back down.

“I never would have guessed,” she says, and he chuckles. When her hands find their way beneath his t-shirt he draws in sharp breath, squirming beneath her but otherwise holding still. “Hands above your head,” she tells him. With a mock pout, he obeys and she draws his t-shirt up slowly, tracing her fingers over muscles that jump beneath her touch as she goes, mouthing at his collarbone on the way past, and finally taking his mouth again as she lets the t-shirt fall to the floor behind the sofa arm. 

While they're kissing, tongues sliding against each other and teeth nipping not-so-gently at lips, she undoes her own shirt and slides it off, quickly followed by her bra. His expression when she draws back and he sees her breasts bared is well worth the effort taken to distract him while she did so.

“Warn a guy next time, Nat,” he croaks out, eyes flickering between her face and chest, fingers twitching as he reaches towards her. As much as she wants to feel his hands on her, knows the strenth he has and the precision with which he can use it, she doesn't want it yet. So she presses his wrists against his sides and tells him they're to stay there, and he agrees with a hoarse “OK”, looking like he'd do anything for her right then.

His bare chest is hot against her breasts as she leans back down, nipples hard and aching as they press against him; she shudders, almost gives in then and tells him to get his hands on her _right now_ , but the strong line of his neck is calling to her and she has ideas for it. 

“'Tasha,” he breathes, tilting his head back as she approaches, body taut beneath her as he waits for her make her move. She takes her time about it, nuzzles at the side of his neck, licks just below his ear, presses her teeth lightly the tendons that stand out and doesn't so much hear as feel the vibrations as he speaks half-words that he never quite manages to finish. His hips press up against hers again, then fall as he catches himself, although now he can't stop himself shifting restlessly afterwards and she can feel herself get wetter as he rubs against her.

“Stay still,” she murmurs, moving one hand up to close carefully around the base of his neck.

“It gonna hurt if I don't?” he manages to get out, lacking his usual snappy delivery. Natasha doesn't bother to reply, just holds him in place and closes her teeth sharply around a patch of skin just below his jaw. A strangled sound comes out of his throat but when she lifts her head up he says desperately, “No, go on,” so she does.

Beneath her he rocks against her and she rocks back, establishing a rhythm, letting the arousal rise at the feel of his cock pressed against her through their clothes. She bites her mark into his skin and he lets her, doesn't object when she tightens her hand around his neck just fractionally, mutters nonsense in between begging her to carry on. The whole time his hands stay at his sides, fists clenching and unclenching against her thighs but making no move to stop her or take control.

It's a submission, a trust, a faith that she doesn't understand because she doesn't have that confidence in herself yet. If anything their positions should be reversed; she should be the one relying on him not to hurt her, something he's earned countless times over by not doing so, by never having the urge to do so, by not having the _capacity_ to do so. She can't say the same for herself. There are days when she wakes up from dreams which should be nightmares but really aren't; others with memories she knows aren't hers pushed to the front of her head, and it takes her less time to push them back down each time but they're still _there_. She's not a good person and she doesn't normally care, but she cares about Clint and he cares about that.

“Nat? Natasha?”

With a start, Natasha comes back to herself. Clint sounds worried. When she focuses on his face, he looks worried too. No wonder; she's still got one hand around his neck.

“Sorry,” she says hoarsely, letting go and holding her hands away from him. “Sorry, I didn't mean-”

“Nat, you didn't hurt me,” he cuts in, gently but firmly. “You just kinda zoned out there for a bit.”

“I could have though,” she says dully. She could have squeezed the life out of him while her mind was elsewhere, and come back to a corpse on the sofa where there should have been a Clint Barton smiling and squirming beneath her.

“Nat-”

“I have to go.” She lifts herself off him, pulls her shirt back and buttons it up with fingers that are too steady given the turmoil inside her.

“Alright,” Clint says. Behind her she hears the rustle as he sits up, but that's all he does, all he says. He doesn't try to make her stay or ask her to talk to him, just sits on the sofa while she gathers her things and slips her shoes on. Natasha has never felt so much for him as she does right then. She leaves anyway.

\-- -- -- -- --

For the next few days she avoids Clint, which she's fairly sure he makes easier by not being around where he knows she usually is. In between sparring with Maria, going through tactics with Coulson, and agreeing to train a new agent who is rapidly approaching Maria's skill in hand-to-hand, Natasha reaches her decision about what she's going to do next.

Then she spends hours in the gym burning off her anger and frustration, scaring away anyone who comes near her with venomous curses that are meant for everyone who stripped her of so much, for herself for wanting more than the sensible and safe, for Clint for not telling her she couldn't have it, who brought her here in the first place and made her think she could have a chance. Those last ones aren't fair but she needs to say them aloud anyway, so that the words can fade away in the silence of the gym rather than echoing around inside her head.

At the end of it her legs are shaking and her lungs are burning, but her mind is clear and she's calm. 

\-- -- -- -- --

Going to find Clint is possibly the hardest thing she's done since she arrived. There's every possibility that he's not going to talk to her after this, and that's a loss she really doesn't want to have to handle.

“Hey,” he says, looking absurdly relieved to see her when he opens the door to his room. The mark on his neck has turned a deep shade of purple and briefly she wonders how much crap Coulson gave him for that. It almost makes her smile, before she remembers why she's here and that she's not going to get the chance to put any more marks like that on him.

“Hi,” she replies. “Can I come in?”

“Sure.” He leaves the door open, moves back and seats himself on the chair that's tucked in to the tiny table all these rooms have. Shutting the door behind her, she follows him in and sits herself on the edge of his bed.

“I can't do this,” she says abruptly. It's probably not the most tactful way to start the conversation, but drawing it out isn't fair on either of them. “I'm not ready for this. For us.” Clint's got a sad smile on his face that hurts her chest. She forces not to look away as she carries on, even though that'd be easier. “I'm still working out who I am, Clint, where I fit in here, what I'm doing. There's things I don't know about me that I want to. There are more things I do know that I don't want to.” He cracks a genuine half-smile at that. “I'm sorry,” she says. “You have no idea how much I wish I could do this, how much I'd love to carry on what we started. I'm just not ready to deal with an 'us' as well as...” She runs out of words. “As much as everything else,” she finishes eventually.

Clint nods, looking down at his hands. “OK. I...” He stops, brings his gaze back up. The fact that he seems to be finding this equally as difficult does not make Natasha feel better. “I knew it might turn out like this. I was hoping it wouldn't but...” He stops again. After a moment he adds, “I won't bug you, I promise. You don't have to worry about me making it hard for you, or being around when you don't want me. It's a big base, and I can get another handler so you don't have to stop working with Coulson. I know you like him.”

For a moment Natasha can't figure out what's wrong about that response. Then she does, and she thinks that perhaps she needs to brush up on her Clint Barton communication skills, because she obviously didn't make something clear enough. And maybe, just maybe, this might work out alright after all. 

“I'll still be your friend, Barton,” she says. Please, she thinks, _please_ let him still want that.

So confused is his expression at that, she wonders for a moment if she said it in Russian by accident. “Really?” he says, like he thinks she's going to take it back.

“Yes, really.” She rolls her eyes at him. “Jesus, you've got some serious self-esteem issues.”

His face lights up.

“Wait,” she says before he can speak. “I do mean friends. Indefinitely. Permanently. No 'friends until you figure it out'. No expectations. No 'I'll wait for you' or any of that crap. I'm telling you now that whatever could be between us isn't going to be. I can't do this if you've got expectations of us being anything other than friends. I just need... you.”

“I got that when you said 'I can't do this' and 'friends',” Clint tells her quietly. “But I understand why you need to clarify.”

“And you're alright with that?”

She watches him as he thinks about it, and appreciates the fact that he takes the time to do so. His eyes wander the room as he thinks, and then settle on her as he says with certainty, “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

“Why?”

“For starters, because you asked me to, and I respect the decisions of my friends. And... I guess, as much as I think we'd be amazing as lovers – don't laugh at my phrasing, you know it'd be more than just sex – maybe we'll be even better as friends. You're pretty much the first person I've met here who I like, y'know? I mean yeah there's Coulson, he's great, but he's my handler and he's a busy man. A couple of the other guys are OK but we're not close. Not like you and I are. Or, like we could be. And I haven't had that before. So, just friends, no pressure, that'd be... that'd be kinda nice.”

There's silence for a few moments, before Clint says thoughtfully, “That was really soppy, wasn't it?”

Natasha nods, just barely keeping the smile off her face.

“While I'm at it then...” He stands up and holds his arms out. “You look like you could use a hug.” She considers it. “I could definitely use one,” he adds. She gives in.

He's warm and strong and solid, arms firm around her as he gathers her close and tips his head to rest against hers, and now his touch contains the comfort that has been missing of late. She tightens her arms around him in return and hears him sigh as he lets the tension go, and thinks the same is true for him. The attraction will probably always be there, she's fairly sure, but the nerves and edginess that she's been feeling for weeks are gone now.

They hold each other silently, two lone soldiers watching each other's backs, and Natasha is at peace.


End file.
